tater

This is for the launch Thursday, so anyone in CA who wants a shot at a launch AND an RTLS landing should think about getting within LOS of Vandy.

Found this on Spanish wiki:

I'm guessing July.

They also seem to actually plan on trying to fly this year. Will be interesting.

If I'm alone and driving straight through... I'll get a hotel on the other end. If I have time I'll stop in the middle (it's ~15 hours driving).

We'll know because we'll see the hazards posted. I'm thinking I will rent a car and drive to TX, then fly back—because I will likely not have enough warning to book a RT flight, unless I hear something.

Not yet... April?

Sorry, I clicked translate on the actual tweet. It's 2 transits of the moon taken at different times. One is ISS, the other is Tiangong.

https://www.isaraerospace.com/spectrum

A larger market in launches at lower prices? Again, 2X as many at 1/2 the price? Seems like there is not actually demand for that. Even if there was, and even if there was $40B to be made in total, a decent % is not available to all providers, some will be necessarily attached to national launchers. In addition, $40B is chump change. Apple made $394B in 2022. Amazon generated revenue of $356B in 2022. Tesla had $81B in revenue in 2022. So by 2030 they project the total world launch revenue as equal to 5 weeks of 2022 Apple, 6 weeks of 2022 Amazon, or 6 months of 2022 tesla. I think all will probably have that revenue double by 2030. I think that launch quadrupling seems unlikely—and even if it does it's not a great business compared to just those 3 examples above unless there is a real shift in what can generate customers for spaceflight. I honestly think that for a company set on launch to space as it's raison d'être, the killer app would be tourism. Satellites all have a lifespan measured in years, so even with constant replacements, you only need one launched every X years. Humans can go to space as often as they want to or can afford it. Unlocking this market would require orders of magnitude better safety, and attention to the comfort level required for casual travelers. I just don't see that happening by 2030.

A few questions (though this matches this link I found looking up stuff for the Rocket Lab thread: https://www.polarismarketresearch.com/industry-analysis/space-launch-services-market ). Their methods are not clear, ie: what countries are they looking at, do they include China, or is this just the market accessible to commercial providers? Do they assume current cost structures in that growth? Large players in any increase have to be constellations, but Starlink is exclusively SpaceX launches, and Kuiper is ULA/BO. My link shows regional gains, and some might be wed to regional launchers. India will use ISRO, the PRC will use Chinese LVs, and a % of European launchers will have to use Ariane regardless of cost, etc.. You mention ~1000 F9 equivalent launches/year, but if costs dropped in half, then they actually think there will be 2000 launches a year? Honestly, those sorts of projections (your link and mine) make little sense to me.

^^^ 2 epic aircraft in that image.

Rocket Lab is doing good work with their upper stage. I think that given the small overall launch market, stuff that is useful in space might be a decent hedge. As an aside, I think massive constellations are a phase people will go through, and hopefully grow out of. Regardless, how much constellation demand will truly exist, and how many total launches (yeah, they all need constant service/replacement)? Even at current retail it's maybe billions, but not a lot of billions of dollars per year. Multiple competitive launch providers merely reduces the total revenue stream of launch available. We're in an odd situation where there is effectively a fixed demand from a commercial standpoint. IMO the only way to change that is to create an entirely new market.

Yes, because the operating costs are so much higher for the A380. If the operating cost for Neutron only allows a retail launch price of ~$50M, and SpaceX can afford to fly for a retail of $49M, then the fact that half the capacity is wasted doesn't matter. True, once they establish reliability (customer wants their spacecraft in LEO, not in the ocean ).

While true, for a consumer, what matters is cost. So if I could pay $150 to fly 200 miles in an A380, or $165 to fly in the RJ, I would take the A380—ignoring the fact I'd prefer the empty A380 even if it cost more Bottom line for the commercial launch market is that the customers want reliability, and low cost. They are likely willing to take some reliability hit for sufficiently low cost, or they might pay more for increased reliability if the cost per sat is otherwise the same. "Unused capacity" doesn't figure here in the least. New players offering services to LEO need to be grossly cheaper than SpaceX until they prove reliability. (they've had what, 185 flights in a row now, and Block 5 has had zero failures even as they push reflights).

I was just talking to my wife about this after showing her this paper: https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/research/uploads/prod/2023/03/GPT-4_medical_benchmarks.pdf Got me thinking about the internet and how it has changed things over the last ~30 years. At the time the rubes started using "the web" in the 1990s I was honestly not paying attention. I had already been using the internet daily for 10 years, and was habituated to the places on the web where I was used to looking for information, or discussions, etc. Much of it on USENET. Plain ole text threads, sorta like this forum—which is perhaps why I tend to like forums vs the way reddit threads, but I digress. Anyway, I think those of us paying attention to ML have seen this as a slow burn, and the rest of the world is starting to recognize that we're near where the exponential curve inflects upwards. I think this will change things far faster than the 20-30 years of internet changes on society. Strap in.

Exactly. And all these calculations are sensibly ignoring Starship, since it's still an unknown... but it won't be for long, one way or the other.

Liftoff Coverage is sorta comical Onboard camera images are a camera taking video of a screen in their MCC.